amphibious-thing

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I'm always flattered when people tell me I should write a book on d'Eon but as a hobbyist (who doesn't even speak French!) I really don't think I'm qualified to do so. However I have considered making a video essay because lets be honest most of the people doing that are unqualified and I'm sure I could do a better job than Kaz Rowe.

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One of the fun things about reading history is when a guy you know from something else shows up.

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It’s 2025 and yet we are still stuck on whether or not d’Eon would be diagnosed as a transsexual as per the 1987 edition of the DSM.

Actually Burrows is a good example of how a historian can perpetuate queer erasure without necessarily doing it intentionally. Monsieur D'Eon is a Woman was published in 1995. Kates bases a lot of his analysis of d’Eon’s gender and sexuality on the 1987 edition of the DSM. Burrows then bases his understanding off of Kates without really questioning whether the methodology of this 15-year-old book still holds up. So somehow a book published in 2010 is still being influenced by the 1987 edition of the DSM and all the biases that come with that. And Burrows isn’t the only one. To this day people still cite Kates when talking about d’Eon’s gender and sexuality.

[amphibious-thing]

Actually Burrows is a good example of how a historian can perpetuate queer erasure without necessarily doing it intentionally. Monsieur D'Eon is a Woman was published in 1995. Kates bases a lot of his analysis of d’Eon’s gender and sexuality on the 1987 edition of the DSM. Burrows then bases his understanding off of Kates without really questioning whether the methodology of this 15-year-old book still holds up. So somehow a book published in 2010 is still being influenced by the 1987 edition of the DSM and all the biases that come with that. And Burrows isn’t the only one. To this day people still cite Kates when talking about d’Eon’s gender and sexuality.

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You’re not wrong but his source literally says she was asexual.

or maybe she was asexual

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The more I read about d'Eon the more I'm convinced she had breasts.

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breeches and stockings should make a comeback tbh. also big linen shirts paired with vests

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or maybe she was asexual

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So Frédéric Gaillardet wrote a novel in which he depicts a trans woman as a man who used dressing as a woman to gain the trust of women and girls and sexually assault them. And then people in the year 2025 are apparently reading this and their main take away is that they need to inform everyone on the internet that d'Eon was actually a cis man. Like this isn't a super common transmisogynistic trope.

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This is definitely in the realm of things that are not really that big of a deal but annoy me anyway but can we stop tagging things Hamilton when they’re only tangentially related to Alexander Hamilton. Not everything is about him.

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I am indeed OP :P

ummm...

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Look he might have been their daddy but he wasn’t really their dad.

ummm...

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Morande: calls Beaumarchais adorable

Me:

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I think there is probably some middle ground between assume every GNC woman was actually a binary trans man and we can only ever suggest even the possibility of transness if a historical figure said word for word "I am transgender"

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OP I know you just copied this from the NPG so this criticism is more for them but good god this summery is so bad. I can't decide if the worst part is the misgendering/degendering, the way they leave out pertinent information, or the baffling use of the term "female sexuality".

Chevalier d'Eon

Artist: Thomas Stewart British, (1766–1801)

Date: 1792

Medium: Oil on canvas

Collection: National Portrait Gallery, London, United Kingdom

Chevalier d'Eon

A soldier and diplomat, the Chevalier d’Eon was one of the most colourful and celebrated characters in eighteenth-century Britain. Although born in France, the Chevalier lived in London from 1762-1777 as a man, and from 1785-1810 as a woman. During both these periods d’Eon was a noted figure in international politics, high society and popular culture.

D’Eon first came to London in 1762 as part of the French embassy and helped negotiate the Peace of Paris, which ended the Seven Years War. Despite being awarded the Croix de St Louis, d’Eon refused to return to France when recalled. Insted, d’Eon published secret correspondence that revealed French ministerial corruption and blackmailed the French King by threatening to disclose secret information about French invasion plans. To silence d’Eon, Louis XVI offered the Chevalier an official pension in 1775 but made the unprecedented condition that d’Eon should henceforth dress as a woman. This command was probably due to rumours of female sexuality, encouraged by d’Eon. D’Eon reputedly attended cross-dressing balls during a previous diplomatic mission to Russia and bought corsets while living as a man in London.

D’Eon’s new identity as a woman brought even greater fame. The Chevalier returned to Britain in 1785 and forged a new career performing fencing demonstrations. Popular prints show d’Eon fencing in a black dress such as the one in this portrait, and, as here, d’Eon wore the Croix de St Louis during these fights. In England there was constant speculation and wagering about d’Eon’s gender. It was even the subject of a court trial that declared D’Eon to be a woman. Because the stereotype of a woman dressing as a man to join the army, often in pursuit of her sweetheart was widely recognized, the idea of d’Eon as a woman was accepted. Despite a lack of feminine ‘delicacy’, d’Eon was upheld by pioneering feminists such as Mary Robinson and Mary Wollstonecraft as a shining example of ‘female fortitude’ to which British women might aspire.

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Me: he is an awful man

Also me: I must know every thing about him

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"The Marquis de Villette, a minor poet and the most notorious French sodomite of his time, showed rather more spirit than Marigny when faced with Morande's threats. Villette had been the butt of many of the Gazetier cuirassé's most puerile anecdotes, bon mots and homosexual jokes. It announced the invention of a carriage that could only be mounted from behind: it would be called a coach à la Villette ... when Morande offered to sell his silence for 5o Louis, he responded by 'asking him for 100 Louis for other yet more secret and curious anecdotes that he could append to his manuscript'."

~ A Kings Ransom by Simon Burrows p51